Lady Sings the Blues

Touching story! unbelievable,interesting,amazing,lyrical Goddess,captivating and factually correct information about the 'real' Billie Holiday

This book is great, regardless of the ghost writing and the liberties with the "truth". I read it years ago but have been listening to Lady Day all evening.Plus it gives me the chance to post this performance again which, as I have said before, is the greatest musical performance I have ever had the pleasure of seeing. Not only from Billie, of course, but good god that is a line up - Young, Webster, Hawkins etc etc etc - just perfection and completely heartbreakingly beautiful.So if you have nev [...]

My mom was a jazz band singer in the same era as Billie Holiday. All the young singers were in awe of Billie, according to Mom, but her addiction was well-known. Her nickname in the music trade was "Miss Needles." The music industry in the late 1930's and early 1940's was one of the few places where whites and African-Americans could mingle freely -- Mom was white and worked with many persons of color. Unfortunately, once off stage and off the work sites, in the southern cities where they worked [...]

there are voices which upset you. a particular tessitura which speaks to you. I remember the last Sarah Vaugahn's concert in France. The very sizeable newspaper "Le Monde" titrated : is it still necessary to listen to Sarah Vaughan? Appalling idiot. She was brilliant. She died few time after. And I remind to Montserrat Caballe, Waltraud Meier, to Chet Baker… All these singers who spoke directly in the heart. Billie, I can only listen to her records. There are in its voice so much sensuality an [...]

It helps to have some historical perspective on this book as you read it. Yes, it's a sad tale of the rise and struggles of an amazing jazz legend and you can't help but hear the voice of Billy as the story unfolds (I could not resist playing her music on my IPod in the background). But it's also important to keep in mind that the book is not always precisely truthful, perhaps for lots of personal, historical, and publishing reasons. I think it's best read for the general history, impressions/tr [...]

Touching story! unbelievable,interesting,amazing,lyrical goddess,captivating and factually correct information about the 'real' Billie Holiday (paperback!)

Normally, I would mark this book as a 3, possibly 4, star work, but there are two severe complications in that regard. One, Holiday herself claimed to have never read the book, or have much to do with it; it stands to reason that her attitude is direclty related to fact two, which is that many pieces of this particular story have been contradicted and/or proven false by historians and contemporaries. As a fan of Holiday and her art, this is a maddening situation, as her truth was stranger, and s [...]

Eleanora Fagan was born April 7, 1915. Her mother was only 13 and her father was pretty much absent. Eleanora was raised by family while her mother worked; her childhood was painful and short. At 13 Eleanora was working as a prostitute, by 14 she was singing her unique style of jazz as Billie Holiday in Brooklyn clubs. Racism and drug addiction dogged her for most of her career but her unyielding spirit could never by broken. In "Lady Sings the Blues" Billie Holiday tells us her story in her own [...]

Hated the film starring Diana Ross. Bought the paperback years ago for a couple of dollars but didn't read it until now. Yes, Billie is fast and loose with some facts - her mother almost certainly was 18 or 19 when Billie was born, not 13 as Billie claims. Then there's the limitations arising from 1) the hurry to publish in order to generate money to defend drug charges and 2) the suppression of 20-30% of the original manuscript by folks with business interests in Lady Day. None of those factors [...]

Lendo esse livro, dá pra entender porque Billie cantava como cantava. Quanta aventura, quanto sofrimento! Racismo, drogas, falsidade de amigos e amantes, prisões, coração partido, estupros, tragédias familiares, fome. Billie realmente passou por tudo, e todo esse sentimento estava na música que criou e que é tão (inutilmente) imitada. Depois de virada a última página, você vai lamentar nunca tê-la conhecido ou visto de perto, no palco, ou tocado com ela, ou bebido com ela.

Excecional. Na verdade este livro não é uma autobiografia desta grande cantora. É "apenas" a versão de Billie Holiday sobre a sua própria vida, sem grande rigor histórico mas que acaba por ser emocionante. Esta senhora teve uma vida duríssima, triste e marcada pelo racismo e descriminação. Depois deste livro entende-se bem as palavras de "strange fruit". Recomendo.

She was an unusually interesting unique person. Too bad she fell down the drug addict hole, dying with heroin for her next shot strapped to her thigh. I prefer her as a musician rather than as an author. This was a patchy book with missing pieces. I was aware that there was more than one author since the writing flow and style was often jerky. Also, this book seemed to me to be a mix of authenticity and untruth. I say "untruth" because there were several incorrect assertions, for one example, wh [...]

I absolutely loved this book! It felt like Billie was talking to me herself. Next to Ella she is my favourite Jazz singer. I love her versions of Good Morning Heartache and Crazy He Calls Me.

It's very difficult to know what to say about this memoir, since it wasn't exactly written by Billie Holiday, but by her friend William Dufty, who based it on interviews and other conversations with her. This review at the San Francisco Chronicle says that the book is full of "factual inaccuracies and exaggerations" but "captures [Holiday's] tart voice and unflinching eye," and that Dufty's "aim was to let Holiday tell her story her way." It sounds like a lot of the events didn't happen as descr [...]

Without a doubt one of the most recognizable voices in the jazz-scene (and possibly the most powerful), Billie Holiday’s autobiography is just as wonderful and emotional as her vocal work.“Lady Sings the Blues” is as diverse, bewildering and touching as her music. There are great moments of triumph and seemingly endless times of hardship, tragedy and sadness. From her childhood, during which she hardly knew about her father and she’d spend most of her time running errands for a local who [...]

Lejdi peva bluz je knjiga koju bih preporučila onima 1. koji vole i cene Bili Holidej te žele da steknu bolji uvid u njen tragični život i celu bluz / džez scenu tog perioda2. koji su strastveni ljubitelje biografija in general ( kao što sam ja)Bilo je teško oceniti ovu knjigu.u pitanju je ipak nečiji život a smatram da je nerealno isti karakterisati sa dosadno/uzbudljivo, dobro/ loše, 1/2//5 zvezdicaPa evo negativnih strana: Ono što je presudilo u korist prosečne ocene jeste činjen [...]

This was a riot. A sad, moving riot.

This memoir, ghostwritten purportedly in Lady Day's speaking style, was an eerie, engaging account of her life. This edition is preceded by an intro that mentions the above about the book's authorship, that it has fielded criticism for taking liberties with the truth, and details about Ms Holiday's demise that lent a certain dramatic irony to the reading that I at times resented (e.g wondering whether this or that unbelievable anecdote is indeed true) but in the end appreciated. The accounts of [...]

I might have over rated it by a star I'm currently enamoured with memoirs. Lady's memoir is particularly honest and gritty at the same time. It provides a vivid picture of racism and poverty that most black people went through in the middle twentieth century. My father tells me he remembers seeing separate bathrooms and water fountains when his parents went to Memphis for a vacationI digress, Billy Holiday has a lust for life and feels emotions deeply. Trying to help her father and mother. In sp [...]

Touching autobiography. As a recovered heroin addict, I am amazed at the stories of other addicts. Billie faced things in her life that I cannot even imagine, as she had to use the back door for performances in the South, as the police cramped down on opiates, given permission through the Harrison Tax Act, and they clamped down on Billie, only after she released Strange Fruit. Damn, Billie was an amazing woman. So full of sadness, pain, joy, and love

I read this years ago and still remember it. Felt like Billie had gotten off the page and was having an intimate conversation with me. Loved it, loved it, loved it. She got knocked down a lot as you'll see. One of the parts that really sickened me was when she was set to perform at a venue and had to use the bathroom, but they wouldn't let her because she was black. Aaaagh! But the woman, incredibly, still kept her sense of humor and strength throughout.

"I've been told that nobody sings the word 'hunger' like do. Or the word 'love'All I've learned is wrapped up in those two words. You've got to have something to eat and a little love in your life before you can hold still for any damn body's sermon on how to behave. Everything I am and everything I want out of life goes back to that."It's been 60 years since Holiday published her autobiography, and we still haven't internalized this lesson.

No son sólo las memorias de una de las cantantes más destacadas del jazz, es el retrato de una época. Es un libro sobre racismo, sobre injusticia, sobre amor.Te ayudará a entender por qué Billie cantaba como cantaba."Me han dicho que nadie canta la palabra hambre como yo. Ni la palabra amor. Tal vez yo recuerde lo que quieren decir esas palabras. Ni todos los Cadillac y visones del mundo -y he tenido unos cuantos- pueden lograr que las olvide."

A wonderful read. Lady Day was strong, vulnerable, funny and a very smart person. She had a big heart and an enormous gift. It was a tragic day the day she died. But through her singing and through these words she lives on without the vulnerability. A truly amazing person!

True or not, it really captivated me.

Billie Holiday is the Blues, though she defied easy categorization and still subverts critical interpretation. Her influence on vocalists has transcended time, genre, and crucially race, but Lady Day never benefited directly from her commercial success in a music industry that would pay a flat fee for performance with no mention of royalties. From a traumatic childhood in Baltimore of sustained physical and emotional abuse, molestation, Lady Day was the victim of an abduction and attempted rape [...]

"If you find a tune and it’s got something to do with you, you don’t have to evolve anything. You just feel it, and when you sing it other people can feel something too." That pretty much sums up the genius of Billie Holiday. She is, inarguably, one of the world's greatest jazz singers. Few, if any, singers can deliver emotion through song quite like Billie Holiday. Her signature raspy voice makes you feel all of her pain and her joy. Her autobiography tells the source of that joy and pain. [...]

Deeply sad. A primer on the corrosive power of celebrity, on white and male privilege, and on the deep rot in US law enforcement. Like Michael Jackson (and the books and lives are really quite similar), Holiday is primarily concerned with her craft, but also wants to settle scores, name-drop every celebrity she can think of, and most of all, assure the reader of her bona fide came-from-nothing credentials. Throughout she is unhesitatingly cynical about the workings of power, which she has felt c [...]

Triste pra caralho. Por outro lado, há um certo alento em Lady Day estar contando sua própria história, nos seus próprios termos, com sua própria voz (ainda que as letras sejam de William Dufty). Essa voz era feroz e intensa, e ela possuía uma clareza enorme sobre sua condição e suas aflições. Ao falar da própria vida, ela não deixa, constantemente, de remeter à dimensão política do que se passa, abrindo a história pessoal para a história coletiva.Um livro como esse é um testem [...]

I'm always attracted to those who rise, even temporarily, above horrific conditions. Billie Holiday, a woman with a once-in-a-lifetime voice, describes her life with a matter of fact attitude that belies a life of physical, sexual and substance abuse. Yet, she rose. The book is very conversational, flowing as if co-author William Dufty stayed as close to the transcripts as possible. He smoothed out the language and, as I've read, changed situations and people to avoid legal entanglements. But it [...]